Jennifer Estep - Web of Lies

The stalactites that had been hanging overhead dropped to the ground like pointed guillotine blades. The first wave skewered the giant who’d been injured before, until he resembled some sort of oversize voodoo doll with a mass of rocky pins stuck in it. The second man got half a dozen steps back toward the mine entrance before one of the rock spears split his head open. I saw his blood hit the wall even through the spray of water, dust, and falling rock.

Tobias Dawson was smarter than his minions. Tougher too. Like me, he dived forward, avoiding most of the deadly stalactites. The dwarf bounced up onto his feet.

He saw me cowering in the recess, and his blue eyes narrowed in hate.

“I’ll kill you for this, bitch!” His roar echoed through the cavern even above the hiss of water and thunder of the splintered stones.

The dwarf ran in my direction, still dodging the falling rocks and cascading water. His blue eyes burned with magic. He stretched out his hands, ready to throw his power at me or to drag me out of the recess and into the falling debris. Probably both. The dwarf might survive the punishment of the ceiling collapse, but I wouldn’t.

My body wasn’t as tough and strong as his. I didn’t have my knives, so there was only one thing left I could do to fight him off.

This time, I threw my magic at him.

My Ice magic. It was all I had left. I’d exhausted the Stone to collapse the ceiling. So I focused on the water droplets flicking through the air in front of the charging dwarf, freezing and flinging them at Dawson. I was already weakened from the effort of drawing on so much magic, so instead of the knives I’d imagined, the droplets turned to shards of Ice that did little more than prick the dwarf ’s thick skin. It didn’t slow him down. Another few feet, and he’d be able to reach me. And then I’d get dead.

Determination rose inside me — cold, hard, unflinching.

I reached for my Ice magic again. It was harder this time, so fucking hard, like trying to scoop up water with wide fingers. Every time I gathered up enough power, it slipped away. So I reached for it again, clenching my hands around the trickle of magic inside me. It tried to slip away, but I held on tight and pulled, yanking it to me, bending it to my will.

And something inside me wrenched.

For a moment, I felt like a raw egg that had been dropped on the floor — broken, messy, oozing. But then magic filled me. More Ice magic than I’d ever felt before.

I didn’t stop to think about where it had come from or whether this was all some sort of deathbed hallucination on my part. I used the magic to freeze more of the water rushing through the air and threw it at Dawson.

This time, the droplets formed long, slender icicles that zipped through the dusty air like daggers. The dwarf saw them coming. He stopped in his tracks about five feet away from me and brought his own Stone magic to bear, trying to block my attack, trying to use his elemental power to harden his skin against the crude weapons, as I’d done so many times before.

But it didn’t work.

Maybe he was too distracted by the chaos around him.

Maybe I’d wrecked his concentration with my initial sneak attack. Maybe I’d upset the order of his perfectly arranged duel, and he just didn’t know how to recover from the unfairness of it all.

Whatever the reason, my icicles slammed into Dawson’s chest with all the force of one of my silverstone knives. The blue glow of magic snuffed out of the dwarf ’s bulging eyes, and he opened his mouth to scream. The rest of the ceiling began to collapse, drowning out his hoarse cries.

It should have been dark in the cavern, which was choked by dust, debris, mud, and water. But it wasn’t.

There was a light on — me. I stared down at my hands.

The spider rune scars on my palms, the ones that had been caused by the silverstone metal burning into my flesh all those years ago, were on fire — with icy flames.

And I felt the power surge through me again, greater than before. Ice magic that felt almost as strong as my Stone power did.

Not good.

For a moment, my eyes met the dwarf ’s. Panic, fear, pain, and awe flashed in Tobias Dawson’s gaze. And then he was gone, swallowed up by the falling rock, rushing water, and suffocating dust. I curled into a tight ball and huddled in the wall recess as the earth and stone shook around me. The stones’ vibrations roared a violent, unending scream inside my head. I’d shattered the cavern ceiling with my magic, caused it as much pain as Dawson and his mining equipment ever had. The sound made my stomach clench. But it had been the stone or me, and I’d choose me every single time.

So I closed my eyes and listened to the stone wail as the cavern collapsed on top of me.

I huddled in my usual hiding place, a small crack in the alley wall behind the Pork Pit. The enclosed space always made me feel safe. Secure. Perhaps it was because I knew no one could squeeze in here after me — especially someone as big as the giant I’d just killed.

Half an hour had passed since Douglas had forced his way into the restaurant and attacked Fletcher and Finn. My tears were gone, but blood still coated my hands from where I’d killed the giant. I scratched my fingernail across my skin, leaving a white mark in the rusty brown stains. I’d done it again. Killed again. Just like I had the night the Fire elemental had murdered my family, and I’d collapsed my own house down on top of them all — including Bria, my baby sister. My stomach twisted. Somehow, I forced down the hot bile that rose in my throat.

The back door of the Pork Pit eased open, and Fletcher Lane stepped into the alley. The middle-aged man didn’t say a word as he sat down cross-legged a few feet away from me.

His green eyes were as bright as a cat’s, although his face sagged with weariness and pain from where the giant had hit him.

I stayed in my crack, my little refuge, and wondered if this was the part where Fletcher told me to leave — and never come back. He’d seen what I’d done to the giant, what I was capable of. Who would want someone like that hanging around?

“You’ve been here a while now,” Fletcher said in a quiet voice. “You’re a smart kid, Gin. I’m sure you’ve noticed things. Like me being gone so much.”

And coming back with blood all over you , I thought.

I didn’t know what Fletcher was getting at, but at least he wasn’t telling me to get lost — yet. “Yeah, I have.”

He nodded. “I’m sure you’ve wondered where I go, what I do. All the trips I take.” Fletcher turned his eyes to me, so that I felt the full force of his green gaze. “It’s time you knew the truth, especially after tonight. I’m an assassin, Gin. Have been for years.”

Maybe I should have been surprised or stunned or even horrified. But I wasn’t. After my family’s murder and the harsh realities of living on the streets, nothing much shocked me anymore. My childhood and my innocence were gone, replaced by the knowledge people were mean, cold, crazy, dangerous.

So I just nodded my head, as if his revelation made perfect sense to me. In a twisted way, it did.

“Do you know what being an assassin means?” Fletcher asked.

I shrugged. “You kill people for money.”

He smiled. “Most of the time. Sometimes though, I get offered jobs I don’t take. Sometimes the people I turn down get angry with me. Sometimes they find me, come after me.”

“Like Douglas?”

“Just like Douglas.”

Despite the weirdness of the conversation, I found myself curious to learn more about this other life Fletcher led. “Who did Douglas want you to kill?”